Wednesday - Letter From Afghanistan: What I Carry

Former Trump press secretary Kayleigh McEnany dismissed a massive article detailing the trials and tribulations of women in the GOP as a hate piece and not worth reading. Reading this article may give some conservative and independent women a chance to pause and take a look at how they are treated, but that's not allowed on Fox News or in MAGA. Rebecca Traister wrote a comprehensive piece on how women have fared in the Republican party, which includes the MAGA cult. The article contains numerous examples of female politicians and the hoops they jump through to stay relevant in the GOP.

Breaking news: Donald Trump is not the sharpest knife in the drawer. Former President Donald Trump failed to impress everyone in a room full of top CEOs Thursday at the Business Roundtable’s quarterly meeting, multiple attendees told CNBC. “Trump doesn’t know what he’s talking about,” said one CEO who was in the room, according to a person who heard the executive speaking.

Former Trump advisor Sloppy Steve Bannon has been making a lot of threats lately. Even though he tries to act like a tough guy, he's not. He needs to march his grifty ass to report to prison on July 1st to begin a 4-month sentence for contempt of court after failing to comply with a lawful subpoena issued by the January 6th Committee. And, of course, the threats Bannon issues involve being carried out by Trump supporters, the same people he ripped off with his We Build the Wall scam, which he pleaded not guilty to several charges of money laundering, conspiracy, and scheming to defraud in connection with $15 million in donations going to the wall scam.

Crackpot Evangelical Rep. Anna Paulina Luna is floating a nonsensical idea to put Merrick Garland in jail to appease the MAGA cult. Maria: Thank you so much for being here and Congresswoman, I want to start with you because the DOJ said it will not prosecute Merrick Garland over these contempt of Congress charges. They sent a letter to Speaker Johnson, your next move in the House. Luna: Yeah, so actually several months ago I introduced a resolution for something called inherent contempt of Congress. So this is something that Congress has the authority to do and it hasn't been done since the early 1900s and essentially what that does is, I anticipated that the Department of Justice would not do their job and so I had this really teed up and ready to go. I've brought this to Speaker Johnson's attention and what that allows Congress to do is really be the punitive arm and really hold Garland accountable by using the Sergeant at Arms to essentially go and get him as well as the tapes, bring him to the wall of the House and really be a check and balance on the Department of Justice. Again, this hasn't been done since the early 1900s but that vote will be coming to the floor and hopefully we will be able to bring some accountability. I know that if this goes to courts as Johnson has stated, that's really going to get stuck there. It's not going to do anything and the American people deserve more than strongly worded letters.read more

WASHINGTON — The IRS plans to end a major tax loophole for wealthy taxpayers that could raise more than $50 billion in revenue over the next decade, the U. S. Treasury Department says. The proposed rule and guidance announced Monday includes plans to essentially stop “partnership basis shifting” — a process by which a business or person can move assets among a series of related parties to avoid paying taxes. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] Biden administration officials said after evaluating the practice that there are no economic grounds for these transactions, with Deputy Treasury Secretary Wally Adeyemo calling it “really just a shell game.” The officials said the additional IRS funding provided through the 2022 Inflation Reduction Act had enabled increased oversight and greater awareness of the practice. “These tax shelters allow wealthy taxpayers to avoid paying what they owe,” IRS commissioner Danny Werfel said. Read More: How Giant Corporations Can Still Get Out of Paying Taxes Due to previous years of underfunding, the IRS had cut back on the auditing of wealthy individuals and the shifting of assets among partnerships and companies became common. The IRS says filings for large pass-through businesses used for the type of tax avoidance in the guidance increased 70% from 174,100 in 2010 to 297,400 in 2019.

This article is part of The D. C. Brief, TIME’s politics newsletter. Sign up here to get stories like this sent to your inbox. The actual roadmap for 2024 might have moved when you were not looking. Maybe—and it’s a big maybe, admittedly—the biggest detour in politics right now is parked in the driveway. [time-brightcove not-tgx=”true”] In ways subtle and overt, the electric vehicle has become the avatar for clean energy in the minds of voters, which may prove to be a political clunker for Democrats, despite having the stronger story to tell.